As we move through winter solstice and the northern hemisphere officially tips back toward the Sun, the heavily-charged year of 2012 comes to a close with a conjunction between the Sun and Lord of the Underworld Pluto in Capricorn, exact December 30. The End Times hangover starts to dig in here.
Huh. We're still here. And we still have the same problems to deal with on this planet. Imagine that.
As Ascension Fever starts to lift and the pumped-up End Times mania peters out, the stark situation we're faced with on this planet is lit up as 2012 closes, brought right into our current, conscious moment by the Sun-Pluto conjunction. There can be no denying it. We're staring straight into the heart of the beast. And the complexity of the root system sustaining its life is absolutely staggering.
At the same time, we're also quite aware at this time that we're not alone with it. We're possibly more aware of this than ever before. Soul mate asteroid Juno is in Capricorn, taking part in a sea goat stellium with Mercury, the Sun, and Pluto. We know now that there are people who see what we see, who understand what we understand. There are people facing down this beast all over the globe - the others who have not stopped, who have not let up.
We may seem to be physically alone in our travails. We may not see a single living soul around who seems to understand. But we do form a framework and a root system of our very own, one that is ultimately unbreakable, unshakable. We're working toward the same goals, however we go about it.
Turning the vicious plans of the global financiers ass over teakettle. Slipping out of multiple layers of control mechanism driving us into (continued) hell on Earth. Breaking free, one down and dirty Plutonic realization at a time. Freeing energy and re-directing resources toward the improvement of conditions on this planet while moving out of the structures built and reinforced by dinosaurs.
Our Juno soul mates can also be of the highly frictional variety right now, getting under our skin, showing us the extent of the obstacles in our way. These people and situations are the thorns in our sides, showing us the type of commitment and the degree of hard work it's going to take to make progress and to achieve goals under these conditions.
There are Juno in Capricorn soul mates out there now who are vying for our spot, ready to knock our feet out from under us, ready to capitalize on our hard work. These soul mates give us the competitive edge now, showing us where we need to fortify, where we need a more honed strategy, where we could use more solid footing, where we need to put in a bit more work.
If there's one piece of advice to glean from our lady Juno in the sign of concrete, hard-won achievement disposited by Saturn in Scorpio, it's this: don't let people climb the mountain you've built. Make them build their own.
We can sidestep most of the crap during Capricorn season if we successfully combine Plutonic awareness of competitors with strategy.
With old school Capricorn, it isn't simply about getting to the top of the heap. It's about staying there once you've arrived. There's often a lot of fear with that sign related to maintaining position, maintaining dominance, maintaining control.
At this point, though, keeping all that fear up is more trouble than its worth.
Goats kept by farmers often have structures put in their pens. Goats like structures and obstacles to climb. If you watch them interacting, one goat will climb to the highest vantage point it can. For a moment, it's the King of the World. Then another goat comes along, a rival, and topples that goat from its lofty perch. Then another comes along and does the same thing. Then the original goat is back in the game, reclaiming its spot. And so on.
The themes here, missing from a lot of the Capricorn of the day, are playfulness, fluidity, a natural organization and re-organization of power and responsibility - even while working earnestly to thwart competitors.
It's really not that big a deal, Cap. You can be the goat at the top of the heap one day and the one at the bottom of the heap the next. It doesn't really matter. You're still the same goat. And maybe you'll realize you don't care about climbing those stinking heaps anymore, anyway.
See, with Pluto transiting Capricorn, the societal definitions of success are slowly morphing. The agreed-upon pinnacles of public prowess are shifting. The things considered prestigious now and in the future are not necessarily the same as they once were.
At a certain point, we barely recognize the old indicators. They become parody. (Weren't they always, when you get right down to it?)
So what, sitting on top of a heap of dirty money is no longer considered the height of success?
Playing every dirty trick in the book as you rise to the top is no longer considered best business practise?
A cookie cutter McMansion is no longer the prime housing situation?
Plastic, fake-tanned Real Housewife isn't the most strived-for look?
Driving your gas-guzzling Escalade to the corner store no longer wins admiration?
Well, it might. But only from people who have their heads wayyyy up their own asses.
As we hurtle headlong into weird and wild Aquarius, the hierarchies are leveling - if we facilitate this. Transformer dwarf planet Pluto in Capricorn is changing the rules of the game. It's changing the Capricorn game altogether.
There's really no need to topple anyone from any mountain if we all have our own to climb. If we're in competition, ultimately, with ourselves. Beating our own best scores and improving on our own best results. The old school Capricorn attachments to "success" and "prestige" and public image and turning the competition into pulp become tiring detritus, easily sloughed off, easily seen through with the Plutonic X-ray vision.
All you have to do is change the rules of the game, and suddenly the hierarchies that seemed set in stone, the dangling carrots that seemed so coveted, the people who seemed so enviable by so many - no longer are.
The Sun conjuncts Pluto December 30.
Mercury conjuncts Juno January 4.
Mercury conjuncts Pluto January 6.
Juno conjuncts Pluto January 14.
Venus conjuncts Pluto January 17.
Venus conjuncts Juno January 17.